Labyrinth

Alice heard François-Baptiste storm out of the room, then watched Marie-Cécile put her arms around Will’s waist and pull him against her. Her nails were bright red against the white of his T-shirt. She wanted to look away, but couldn’t.

  ‘Tiens,’ said Marie-Cécile. ‘A bientôt.’

  ‘Are you coming now?’ said Will. Alice could hear the panic in his voice as he realised he was going to have to leave her trapped.

  ‘Tout à l’heure.’ Later.

  Alice could do nothing. Just listen to the sound of Will’s feet walking out.

  The two men crossed in the doorway.

  ‘Here,’ he said, handing his mother a copy of the same paper Will had been reading earlier.

  ‘How did they get hold of the story so quickly?’

  ‘I have no idea,’ he said sulkily. ‘Authié, I suspect.’

  Alice went rigid. The same Authié?

  ‘Do you actually know that for a fact, François-Baptiste?’ Marie-Cécile was saying.

  Well, someone must have told them. The police sent divers into the Eure on Tuesday, in exactly the right place. They knew what they were looking for. Think about it. Who claimed there was a leak in Chartres in the first place? Authié. Did he ever actually produce any evidence that Tavernier had talked to the journalist?’

  ‘Tavernier?’

  ‘The man in the river,’ he said acidly.

  ‘Ah, of course.’ Marie-Cécile lit a cigarette. ‘The report mentions the Noublesso Véritable by name.’

  ‘Authié himself could have told them.’

  ‘So long as there is nothing to connect Tavernier with this house, there’s no problem,’ she said, sounding bored. ‘Is there anything?’

  ‘I did everything you told me to do.’

  ‘And you have prepared everything for Saturday?’

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted, ‘although without the ring or the book, I don’t know why we’re bothering.’

  A smile flitted across Marie-Cécile’s red lips. Well, you see, this is why we still need Authié, despite your evident mistrust of him,’ she said smoothly. ‘He says he has, miracle, retrieved the ring.’

  Why the hell didn’t you tell me this before?’ he said furiously.

  ‘I’m telling you now,’ she said. ‘He claims his men took it from the English girl’s hotel room in Carcassonne last night.’

  Alice felt her skin turn cold. That’s impossible.

  ‘You think he’s lying?’

  ‘Don’t be idiotic, François-Baptiste,’ she snapped. ‘Obviously, he’s lying. If Dr Tanner had taken it, it wouldn’t have taken Authié four days to get it. Besides, I had his apartment and his offices searched.’

  ‘Then — ’

  She cut across him. ‘If – if - Authie does have it – which I doubt – then either he got it from Biau’s grandmother or else he’s had it all along. Possibly he took it from the cave himself.’

  ‘But why bother?’

  The phone rang, intrusive, loud. Alice’s heart leaped into her mouth.

  François-Baptiste looked to his mother.

  ‘Answer it,’ she said.

  He did what he was told. ‘Oui.’

  Alice hardly dared breathe for fear she would give herself away.

  ‘Oui, je comprends. Attends.’ He covered the phone with his hand. ‘It’s O’Donnell. She says she has the book.’

  ‘Ask why she’s been out of touch.’

  He nodded. Where’ve you been since Monday?’ He listened. ‘Does anybody else know you have it?’ He listened. ‘OK. A vingt-deux heures. Demain soir.’

  He put the receiver back in its cradle.

  ‘Are you sure it was her?’

  ‘It was her voice. She knew the arrangements.’

  ‘He must have been listening in.’

  What do you mean?’ he said, uncertainly. Who?’

  ‘For crying out loud, who do you think?’ she snapped. ‘Authié, of course.’

  ‘I — ’

  ‘Shelagh O’Donnell’s been missing for days. As soon as I’m safely out of the way in Chartres, O‘Donnell reappears! First the ring, then the book.’

  François-Baptiste finally lost his temper. ‘But you were just defending him!’ he shouted. ‘Accusing me of jumping to conclusions. If you know he’s working against us, then why didn’t you tell me, instead of letting me make a fool of myself? More to the point, why don’t you stop him? Have you even ever asked yourself why he wants the books so badly? What he’s going to do with them? Auction them to the highest bidder?’

  ‘I am well aware of precisely why he wants the books,’ she said in a chill voice.

  Why do you always have to do this? You humiliate me all the time!’

  ‘The discussion is over,’ she said. We’ll travel tomorrow. That will get us there in good time for your assignation with O‘Donnell and for me to prepare myself. The ceremony will go ahead at midnight as planned.’

  ‘You want me to meet her?’ he said in disbelief.

  Well, obviously,’ she said. For the first time, she heard some sort of emotion in her voice. ‘I want the book, François-Baptiste.’

  ‘And if he doesn’t have it?’

  ‘I don’t think he would go to all this trouble if he didn’t.’

  Alice heard François-Baptiste walk across the room and open the door.

  What about him?’ he said, a little of the fire returning to his voice. ‘You can’t leave him here to — ’

  ‘Leave Will to me. He, also, is not your concern.’

  Will was concealed in the cupboard in the kitchen passage.

  It was cramped and smelled of leather coats, old boots and waxed jackets, but it was the only place that gave him a clear view of the library and study doors. He saw François-Baptiste come out first and go into the study, followed moments later by Marie-Cécile. Will waited until the heavy door shut, then immediately emerged from the cupboard and ran across the hall to the library.

  ‘Alice,’ he whispered. ‘Quick. We’ve got to get you out of here.’ There was a slight sound, then she appeared. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said. ‘This is all my fault. Are you OK?’

  She nodded, although she was deathly pale.

  Will reached for her hand, but she refused to come with him.

  What is this all about, Will? You live here. You know these people and yet you’re prepared to throw it all away helping a stranger. It makes no sense.’

  He wanted to say she wasn’t a stranger, but stopped himself.

  ‘I — ’

  He didn’t know what to say. The room seemed to fade to nothing. All Will saw was Alice’s heart-shaped face and her unflinching brown eyes that seemed to be looking into the very heart of him.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me that you . . . that you and she . . .? That you lived here.’

  He couldn’t meet her gaze. Alice stared at him a moment longer, then moved quickly across the room and out into the hall, leaving him to follow.

  What are you going to do now?’ he said desperately.

  Well, I’ve learned how Shelagh’s connected with this house,’ she said. ‘She works for them.’

  ‘Them?’ he said, baffled, opening the front door so they could slip out. What do you mean?’

  ‘But she’s not here. Madame de l’Oradore and her son are looking for her too. From what I heard, I’d guess she’s being held somewhere near Foix.’

  Alice suddenly turned in a panic at the bottom of the steps.

  Will, I’ve left my bag in the library,’ she said in horror. ‘Behind the sofa, with the book.’

  More than anything, Will wanted to kiss her. The timing couldn’t be worse, they were caught up in a situation he didn’t understand, Alice didn’t even really trust him. And yet it felt right.

  Without thinking, Will moved to touch the side of her face. He felt he knew exactly how smooth and cool her skin would feel, as if it was a gesture he’d made a thousand times before. Then the memory of the way she’d withdrawn from him in the café pulled
him up short and he stopped, his hand a hair’s breadth from her cheek.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he started to say, as if Alice could read his mind. She was staring at him, then a brief smile flickered across her taut and anxious face.

  ‘I didn’t mean to offend you,’ he stumbled. ‘It’s . . .’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, but her voice was soft.

  Will gave a sigh of relief. He knew she was wrong. It mattered more than anything in the world, but at least she wasn’t angry with him.

  ‘Will,’ she said, a little sharper this time. ‘My bag? It’s got everything in it. All my notes.’

  ‘Sure, yes,’ he said immediately. ‘Sorry. I’ll get it. Bring it to you.’ He tried to focus. ‘Where are you staying?’

  ‘Hôtel Petit Monarque. On the Place des Epars.’

  ‘Right,’ he said, running back up the steps. ‘Give me thirty minutes.’

  Will watched her until she was out of sight, then went back inside. There was a sliver of light showing under the study door.

  Suddenly the door to the study opened. Will sprang back out of sight between the door and the wall. François-Baptiste came out and walked towards the kitchen. Will heard the pass door swing open and shut, then nothing.

  Will pressed his face to the gap so he could see Marie-Cécile. She was sitting at her desk looking at something, something that glinted and caught the light when she moved.

  Will forgot what he was supposed to be doing as he watched Marie-Cécile stand up and lift down one of the paintings hanging on the wall behind her. It was her favourite piece of art. She told him all about it once, in the early days. It was a golden canvas with splashes of bright colour showing French soldiers gazing upon the toppled pillars and palaces of ancient Egypt. ‘On Gazing Upon the Sands of Time — 1798’, he remembered. That was it.

  Behind where the picture had been hanging was a small black metal door cut into the wall with an electronic keypad next to it. She punched in six numbers. There was a sharp click and the door opened. From out of the safe, she lifted two black packages and carefully put them on the desk. Will adjusted his position, desperate to see what was inside.

  He was so caught up that he didn’t hear the footsteps coming up behind him.

  ‘Don’t move.’

  ‘François-Baptiste, I — ’

  Will felt the cold muzzle of a gun pressing into his side.

  ‘And put your hands where I can see them.’

  He tried to turn round, but François-Baptiste grabbed his neck and slammed his face flat against the wall.

  ‘Qu’est-cequi se passe?’ Marle-Cécile called out.

  François-Baptiste jabbed him again.

  ‘Je m’en occupe,’ he said. Everything’s under control.

  Alice looked at her watch again.

  He’s not coming.

  She was standing in the reception of the hotel, staring at the glass doors as if she could conjure Will out of thin air. Nearly an hour had passed since she’d left rue du Cheval Blanc. She didn’t know what to do. Her purse, her phone, car keys were all in her jacket pocket. Everything else was in her rucksack.

  It doesn’t matter. Get away from here.

  The longer she waited, the more she started to doubt Will’s motives. The fact he’d appeared out of nowhere. Alice went over the sequence of events in her mind.

  Was it really just coincidence they’d bumped into each other like that? She’d told no one at all where she was going.

  How could he know?

  At half-past eight, Alice decided she couldn’t wait any longer. She explained she wouldn’t need the room after all, scribbled a note for Will in case he came, giving her number, then went.

  She threw the jacket on the car’s front seat and noticed the envelope sticking out of the pocket. The letter she’d been given at the hotel, which she’d forgotten all about. Alice pulled it out and put it on the dashboard to read when she stopped for a break.

  Night fell as she drove south. The headlamps of the oncoming cars shone in her eyes, dazzling her. Trees and bushes leaped ghost-like out of the darkness. Orléans, Poitiers, Bordeaux, the signs flashed by.

  Cocooned in her own world, for hour after hour, Alice asked herself the same questions over and again. Each time, she came up with a different answer.

  Why? For information. She’d certainly handed that to them all right. All her notes, her drawings, the photograph of Grace and Baillard.

  He promised to show you the labyrinth chamber.

  She’d seen nothing. Just a picture in a book. Alice shook her head. She didn’t want to believe it.

  Why did he help her get away? Because he’d got what he wanted; rather, what Madame de l’Oradore wanted.

  So they can follow you.

  CHAPTER 56

  Carcassona

  AGOST 1209

  The French attacked Sant-Vicens at dawn on Monday the third of August.

  Alaïs scrambled up the ladders of the Tour du Major to join her father to watch from the battlements. She looked for Guilhem in the crowd, but could not see him.

  Now, over the sound of sword and battle cry of the soldiers storming the low defensive walls, she could just make out the sound of singing floating across the plain down from the Gravèta hill.

  Veni creator spiritus

  Mentes tuorum visital

  ‘The priests,’ Alaïs said aghast. ‘They sing to God as they come to slaughter us.’

  The suburb began to burn. As smoke spiralled up into the air, behind the low walls, people and animals scattered in panic in all directions.

  Grappling hooks were hurled over the parapet quicker than the defenders could cut them down. Dozens of scaling ladders were thrown up to the walls. The garrison kicked them down, set them alight, but some held in place. French foot soldiers swarmed like ants. The more who were cut back, the more there seemed to be.

  At the foot of the fortifications on both sides, the injured and dead bodies were stacked one on top of another, like piles of firewood. With every hour that passed, the toll grew greater.

  The Crusaders rolled a catapult into place and began their bombardment of the fortifications. The thuds shook Sant-Vicens to its foundations, relentless, implacable in the storm of arrows and missiles thrown from above.

  The walls began to crumble.

  ‘They’re through,’ Alaïs shouted. ‘They’ve breached the defences!’

  Viscount Trencavel and his men were ready for them. Brandishing sword and axe, two and three abreast they charged the besiegers. The massive hooves of the warhorses trampled all in their path, their heavy steel shoes shattering skulls like husks and crushing limbs in a mass of skin and blood and bone. Street by street, the fighting spread through the suburb, moving ever closer to the walls of the Cite itself. Alaïs could see a mass of terrorised inhabitants flooding through the Porte de Rodez into the Cite to escape the violence of the battle. The old, the infirm, women and children. Every able-bodied man was armed, fighting alongside the soldiers of the garrison. Most were cut down where they stood, clubs no match for the swords of Crusaders.

  The defenders fought bravely, but they were outnumbered ten to one. Like an inrushing tide breaking on the shore, the Crusaders stormed through, breaching the fortifications and demolishing sections of the walls.

  Trencavel and his chevaliers were desperate not to lose control of the river, but it was hopeless. He sounded the retreat.

  With the triumphant howls of the French echoing in their ears, the heavy gates of the Porte de Rodez were opened to allow the survivors back into the Cite. As Viscount Trencavel led his defeated band of survivors in single file through the streets back to the Château Comtal, Alaïs looked down in horror at the scene of devastation and destruction below. She had seen death many times, but not on this scale. She felt polluted by the reality of war, the senseless waste of it.

  Deceived also. Now she realised how the chansons à gestes she had so loved in her childhood had lied. There was
no nobility in war. Only suffering.

  Alaïs descended the battlements to the courtyard and joined the other women waiting at the gate, praying that Guilhem was among the survivors.

  Be safely delivered.

  At last, she heard the sound of hooves on the bridge. Alaïs saw him straight away and her spirit leaped. His face and armour were stained with blood and ash, his eyes reflected the ferocity of the battle, but he was unharmed.

  ‘Your husband fought valiantly, Dame Alaïs,’ said Viscount Trencavel, noticing her standing there. ‘He cut down many and saved the lives of many more. We are grateful for both his skill and courage.’ Alaïs flushed. ‘Tell me, where is your father?’

  She pointed to the northeastern corner of the courtyard. We witnessed the battle from the ambans, Messire.’

  Guilhem had dismounted and handed the reins to his écuyer.

  Alaïs approached him shyly, not sure of her reception. ‘Messire.’

  He took her pale white hand and raised it to his lips. ‘Thierry fell,’ he said in a hollow voice. ‘They’re bringing him back now. He’s badly wounded.’

  ‘Messire, I am sorry.’

  We were as brothers,’ he continued. ‘Alzeu too. Barely a month separated us in age. We stood for each other, worked to pay for our hauberks and swords. We were dubbed the same Passiontide.’

  ‘I know it,’ she said softly, drawing his head down to hers. ‘Come, let me help you, then I will do what I can for Thierry.’

  She saw his eyes glistened with tears. She hurried on, knowing he would not want her to see him cry.

  ‘Guilhem, come,’ she said softly. ‘Take me to him.’

  Thierry had been taken to the Great Hall with all the others who were badly wounded. The lines of dying and injured men were three deep. Alaïs and the other women did what they could. With her hair wound into a plait over her shoulder, she looked no more than a child.

  As the hours passed, the air in the confined chamber grew more putrid and the flies more persistent. For the most part, Alaïs and the other women worked in silence and with steady determination, knowing that there would be little respite before the assault began anew. Priests stepped between the lines of dying and injured soldiers, hearing confession, giving the last rites. Beneath the disguise of their dark robes, two parfaits administered the consolament to the Cathar believers.